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Pictures from the archive: (click on an image to see a larger version and to view the gallery as a slideshow.)
See below for more images.
The Vision
Founded in 1951 by local schoolteachers Joyce Pearce OBE, Ruth Hicks and Margaret Dixon to help displaced children after World War II, the charity took its name from Miss Pearce’s family home ‘Ockenden’ in White Rose Lane, Woking. From these humble beginnings it worked for 50 years helping refugees from around the world.
The initial object of the charity was to receive small numbers of Eastern European teenagers from post World War II displaced persons camps in Germany, and to support them through their secondary education. Although the charity remained small in scale and personal in ethos, within a few years world events and the increasing numbers of refugees world wide would lead it to widen both its remit and its scope, first to help children and students outside Europe during the 1960s, then to play a leading role in the admission and resettlement of Tibetans fleeing oppression and the Vietnamese Boat People.
Vietnamese Boat children 1978. |
Ingrid Bergman 1965. |
Ingrid Bergman 1965. |
The grant enabled the charity’s extensive archive, held at Surrey History Centre, to be catalogued and made available online. The memories of those who either worked for or were helped by the charity were recorded and surviving historic film digitised and preserved for the future. Research using these sources tied in to the production of The Vision by Woking Community Play Association performed in the first part of 2010.
The Ockenden Venture took over Stoatley Rough School in 1960 and renamed it Quartermaine. Click here to find out more about Stoatley Rough School.
The Archive
Click here to read a poem (
pdf) written by Vietnamese refugee, Le Con (b.1919). Le arrived in England in Nov 1979, aged 60 years old and was initially placed at the Ockenden reception centre at Sunshine House, Gosport.
Click here to read an extract (
pdf) from a letter about Ockenden, written by Tibetan refugee, Ugyan Norbu, who came to the UK in the 1970s.
Keith Shaw-Ashton worked at Keffolds in the 1960s and wrote and article about Ockenden for the Readers Digest. Read a response that came from India. The transcript is available as a pdf (
) document. Click on the small image to see the original letter.
More pictures from the archive: (click on an image to see a larger version and to view the gallery as a slideshow.)
For more information about the Ockenden Archive, please contact Surrey Heritage, email shs@surreycc.gov.uk or telephone 01483 518737.
The Play
Ockenden has always been a subject of local pride in Woking and the Woking Community Play Association staged a specially written drama, The Vision, to celebrate the inspiring history of Ockenden. The Vision was based on the tales from the charity which was founded in 1951 by three school teachers Joyce Pearce, Margaret Dixon and Ruth Hicks. The charity went on to achieve international status, in particular for their work with the Vietnamese Boat people and for helping refugees and displaced people. The play was written and directed by Rib Davis, well known local Oral Historian and playwright.
First the play, then the exhibition and now the book! Find out more.
Use this link to visit The Vision website: http://www.thevision.org.uk
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